Allied Telesis AT-8024 Installation Manual page 28

Product Description
28
Before the advent of enhanced stacking, managing a switch meant that
you had to establish a separate management session with it. This often
involved going to the wiring closet where the switch was located and
establishing the session through the RS232 management port on the
switch.
If you wanted to manage your switches remotely from a workstation on
your network using the Telnet application protocol or a web browser,
you had to assign each switch a unique IP address. And when you were
finished managing one switch, you had to end the management session
in order to manage another switch, even if the switches were in the
same subnet.
The enhanced stacking feature simplifies all this. The benefits of this
feature include:
You can manage all the AT-8024GB switches in a subnet from one
G
management session. This eliminates the need of having to
initiate a separate management session with each switch.
The AT-8024GB switches in a subnet can share the same IP
G
address, reducing the number of IP addresses that you need to
assign to your network devices.
New switch software can be downloaded quickly and easily to all
G
the switches from a central source. This can save you the trouble
of having to go to the wiring closets where the switches are
located, starting a management session, and downloading the
new software manually.
Remotely managing a new switch in your network is greatly
G
simplified. Once the switch is connected to the network, the
stacking feature will detect the switch, allowing you to
immediately begin to manage it from any workstation in your
network.
The switches of an enhanced stack can be physically separated by
G
large distances.
Here are a few guidelines to keep in mind when planning this feature for
your network:
There can be only one stack in each subnet in your network.
G
A stack cannot span subnets.
G
There must be at least one AT-8024GB switch in each subnet with
G
an IP address and subnet mask. This switch is referred to as the
Master switch of the enhanced stack.